


to chase away the monsters

by mysticpanda



Category: Alien: Isolation (Video Game)
Genre: Bedtime Stories, Canon-Typical Violence, Domestic Violence, F/M, I will add more as I go, PTSD, Reunion, Robot/Human Relationships, Slow Build, and by reunion I mean both with Samuels and the Alien
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-05-31 11:51:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15118814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mysticpanda/pseuds/mysticpanda
Summary: After Sevastopol Amanda was saved by the Company and brought to the nearest space station called Delion. After one year of recovery she still feels burdened by the loss and misery she's experienced. Burrying herself in work and being a kind of older sister/mother figure to an orpan girl Amanda is ready to accept the closure Samuels has given to her. Assuming he is dead she honors his memory by trying to live a full life.But then why does she feel a familiar terror lurking in the shadows of her new home? How did it get there? Why does it feel like part of her?





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had this cute idea of Amanda telling bedtime stories to orpans but it turned out to be a bit darker and longer, than planned. I'm not sure how long this will get, but I want to make it longer. I hope you will like it! Enjoy :)

  _Once upon a time, in a land frozen in metal and buzzing electricity lived a princess like no other. Her skin  is kissed by    dying stars that  barely  lights up the sky, her eyes brown like oil and her lips hold sweet kisses and warm smiles  .  But the same lips  are pressed  tight together because in her white tower she might be the only person, but shares the space with a terrible monster  . _ _A dragon, a terror that comes at night, hisses and screeches as it hunts for the princess._  

"Can't the princess run away?"

 

"No, not  really , but she can hide" whispered Amanda as she caressed the dirty face of the little girl lying on her lap. They were both in bed, or rather on a bed made out of bags filled with scrap fabrics. It was their secret hideaway on top of an old factory building.

 

Tippa, the girl on her lap was one of the orphans she met during her maintenance trips to the station's garbage disposal unit . For some sick cost-cutting reason the orphanage was right next to the huge pits filled with waste. The kids were usually at the entrance. Waiting for workers to put out boxes filled with useful scraps to collect and sell. Tippa was one of the youngest, filled with hope and childish imagination. She was quick to befriend the 'quiet engineer lady with a sad look on her face'. It was Tippa who showed Amanda this place, she said the view always took her mind off things.

From there they could see the north side of Delion, the rich quarter of the space station. Tall buildings towering over all the city. Glass walled offices with bureaucrats who care about the poor as much as a rat cares about a cockroach. In the end they still share the same garbage pile. 

Amanda found the view both beautiful and sickening. The lights were pretty but they were only there to blind the people. To avert the gazes off the steaming pile of shit that the rest of the station was. Plenty of resources to go around but the privileged few still lets children starve on the street.

Her blood started to boil but then a small tug on her shirt snapped her out of the furry.

"So will a prince save her? He will, right? And then he kisses her and breaks the curse, so she is happy, right? Princesses are always happy, right?" Tppa's question sounded so sweet, so hopeful. Not fit for her ragged clothes and callused hands. Amanda felt bad for lying but maybe, just maybe this counted as keeping the fire alive. Not just inside Tippa, but also in herself, she guessed.

 

"Yeah, she's alright" she scoffed as a grin appeared on Tippa's face. " I'm not sure about the prince though. Don't you think she managed on her own?"

 

"Umm" Tippa took a second to scratch her elbow and then turned to Amanda. "But then who slayed the dragon?  Mrs. Rita always tells us stories where the prince slays the dragon and rides away with the princess on a white horse  . And then he marries her and she marries him and then they live happy after-  Happly  ever- Uh,  happily  ever after! Yeah!"

 

"Well there is no prince in this story, she saved herself" or at least not in her story, she thought. Being found and taken away for by the Company wasn't exactly a romantic ending to the tale. Seeing Tippa's gaze drop to the ground Amanda picked up the story again. "But there are others who can help the princess."

" Really ?! Like who?"

 "Like..." she thought about all the help she's gotten back in Sevastopol. With each face she remembered came an image, a gruesome death. Ricardo, Taylor, Samuels... "Like a brave lion, a smart scarecrow and a kindhearted tin man."

Funny how well the ancient story of Oz fitted mirrored her case. Yet, she, Amanda, never found red slippers with magical properties. And what would this make the creature? The dog; following her with a twisted loyalty? Or was it a monkey with wings, she used to get scared of those when she watched the old movie with her mother. Back when she was six or seven, same age as Tippa but with much less experience of the dark things in life.

 

"So how did they help her?" Tippa asked, reminding Amanda to continue the story. And so she did.

 With a thick coat of sugar.  She painted over misery and death and all that grimm that might've disappeared from her clothes but not from her memories . And Tippa listened. She watched Amanda's hands move as the tale went on. How the princess got away with her three friends. How the dragon's lair got destroyed by a volcano. She clapped when the princess went and started telling others how to fight dragons. 

 

"Quick thinking and never giving up is the key" Amanda explained with an untold story casting glossy tears on her eyes . "You have to keep moving even if you think there in nothing ahead."

 

Nevertheless  , like every story night, this one ended the same: They fell asleep under a thick blanket, first watching the city dim its light and then  slowly  letting their eyes close the same way window shutters did at midnight . 

 

She woke up with a scream.  Abruptly  she got up only to find Tippa already gone. The orphan had to leave early to get to the garbage piles before dawn.

Amanda never knew how the kid did it.  Unlike Tippa, she was always sleeping deep, trapped in her own nightmares, reliving everything that happened in Sevastopol  .  Eventually  she got used to it as much as possible. With a tired groan she took her bag and toolbox and began her way home.

 

Ironically  she did not like her flat in the Ivory Tower of Delion. An unwanted gift from the company after they revived her,  probably  to shut her up. She did shut up. Not for them, but for herself. It was  just  too painful to talk about it. It. 

She pilled off her sweat soaked clothes and entered the shower. Under the running hot water she  carefully  washed her skin. Sensitive from burns she got in a gas leakage accident, she hissed.

 

It wasn't serious, not for her at least. But she did feared her heart would  seriously  stop after that loud explosion. She had to be careful with her heart. She  was told  so. With a finger she  slowly  traced the scar that led from her belly button to her breasts, now white and fading after a year of healing  . Her heart stopped, they said. She had to  be cut  open, they said. They saved her life, they said.

 

"Bullshit" she sobbed, watching her toes curl on the white tiles. She did not need saving. Eternal sleep is what she needed. But the Company, those bastards took that away from her too.

And  maybe  they took something else too. Oh God how  badly  she wanted that scar to be real. She needed it to be real, she needed that weak heart. A thousand heart attacks, rather than one nightmarish creature.

Because she wasn't stupid. She wanted to believe them, she sometimes even believed the heart surgery thing, but come on. She was no doctor, but her heart had no reason to be weak, in need of surgery.

She'd  been trapped  in a hive though. Taken as hostage, as breeding ground. Surrounded by eggs, one must've-

Amanda almost threw up. No. She  just  won't think about that. It has been a year, a _goddamn year_.  She listened to the news, asked around, even went to the marshals' burrow once to see if there are any disappearances, but nothing  .  Just  everyday people killing each other.

 

There is no way of containing that thing for a year. No way.

 

With a slow, painful sigh she exited her bathroom and put on fresh clothes. In a few hours she  was meant  to appear in front of a board to receive her monthly psychical as well as her hush money.

 

She never spent it though, kept it on a private account. Bloody Company will pay for her way off this station. She will buy a ship, take Tippa, maybe her friend Wright if the woman is up for it and go off the grid.

The Ivory Tower was just one stop from the Weyland-Yutani Corps so she took her sweet time to get ready. Brushed her hair and put it in a tight ponytail. Found her most comfortable overal and lamented a few second on which T-shirt to wear under it.  
She smiled and held up the already worn out T that had 'You can suck my Bit' on it. She bought it at a pro-synthetic convention. The first one she's even been to, or even heard of. Back in Sevastopol people weren't really fond of synths and she couldn't blame them. But that didn't ease the dull pain inside her chest, that she wanted to take Samuels to one of these. She wanted him to see how there were others who saw how little difference there was between a synthetic and an organic person.

_You talk like I had an actual life. I thank you for that._

She blinked back tears as she pulled the shirt over her head. Those shitheads up at the office might think Samuels was a valuable asset that was lost but for her he was a friend. A man who made it possible for her to move on. Even if the price was his own _life_.

The other thing she hated about living in this part of the town was the presence of the Company. Not really the office, that was fine, but the synthetics. Some had Samuels' face... They all talked and acted like him too, almost surprised when she apologized for bumping into them or, back when she was new there, asking for directions. Walking among them made her run out of air quicker. Her chest tightened as she tried to look away from the constant reminders of what she had lost.

"Your face is sour as ever, Ripley" reported Wright when Amanda arrived to WY HQ. "May I know why?" The woman was waiting for her at the reception desk, already wearing medical apparel. It gave the impression to others that she was ready to chase down patients in order to collect some samples. Her blond hair in a ponytail that always threatened to get loose, thick hair breaking the hair tie around it.

"Just one of those days, Wright. I had a rough night, rough week... rough decade."

The woman just nodded and gave her a comforting smile. "Are you ready to get your blood drawn or should we wait until detoxification?"

"I'm not hungover, I'm just..." Amanda searched for the right words. 

"You are getting close to the anniversary, aren't you?" Wright tilted her hand and long blonde locks fell to her face. "Oh, seems like my hair tie broke again."

She was so stoic, so devoid of any kind of frustration, Amanda doubted the woman would ever get fed up with the life there and leave if given a chance. Still, Amanda hoped for the best. Beside Tippa, Wright was her only friend. 

A child and a robot, thats great, she thought every time she reflected on her social circle. But everyone else seemed so distant and honestly, too boring. She felt no connection with them.

They entered the elevator together and Wright pushed the button for the top floor. Amanda became a bit more at ease. Nothing bad happens in an elevator, she thought. In that moment, as if the universe was answering to her the elevator stopped prematurely. Lights died. Then red light flashed. They were stuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, first chapter is done. I'm still getting the hang of this so any kind of feedback is welcomed! :) See ya~


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the long wait! I can not thank you enough for all the kind comments and kudos you gave me, I will work hard to get better at updating and writing in character. I hope you like this chapter and maybe leave a comment and sweet delicious feedback!

"What is happening?" 

Amanda grabbed the rail on the wall for some support as her legs gave out in the moment the lights turned red. Pulling herself up she met with her wide-eyed self in the wall mirror. She immediately looked up and ducked away from under the vent. 

Was she on Sevastopol? Did she ever leave? It was the same orange-red emergency light. She couldn't decide. Her brain, flushed with memories now, forced her mucles to work. To get ready to crawl and whack and run away and into a nonexistent safe place.

Wright on the other hand had her stoic expression on, checking her watch as if she lacked an inner clock. She was just programmed that way, showing boredom when people around her got excited as a way to neutralize the overall mood. But now Ripley just wanted to bash her skull in. Not out of hate, but out of sheer habit.

 _No, it's not her, it's not the synths,_ Amanda reminded herself. 

"Ripley please take deep breaths and remain calm. I know this situation is hard on you, but you must remain calm. It's just a power outage."

"It's never just a fucking power outage" she hissed. She needed to get out and get out  _now._ They were close to the desired floor, all she needed was to open up the maintenance panel and bypass the door, that way-

"Ripley!" Wright shouted and put a firm hand on her shoulder. The lights were back to normal. The elevator rebooted.

"My deepest apologies, Miss Ripley" a voice cooed as the elevator door hissed open to reveal the executives' suit. A tall, blond man, an ancient David model stood nonchalantly in the hallway. Now that was a face Amanda was just dying to ruin. Last time she was there the robot almost laughed at her for expressing her anger about the secrecy of her condition. 

 _"You are just a pawn, Miss Ripley. Clearly you can't see the bigger picture"_ he said back then and the way he looked at her made it obvious, that his smugness hasn't been re-calibrated since then. Robots like these gave other synthetic people a bad name. They were almost programmed to be arrogant, to look down on anyone who was too low in WY's food chain. 

"You know where to stick it" she finally answered, heading to the conference room. There she could see the three men sitting around an oval marble table and one standing at the wide glass window, showing his back. She halted as the man turned around, he had Samuels' face. His fucking face. It made her stomach turn.

"Greetings, Amanda" he smiled and stepped forward. His uniform was freshly washed and ironed. A hint of a familiar cologne lingered in the air, mixed with the smoke of a recently cut cigar.

"What is this?"

"Please calm down Ripley, your heart" Wright reminded her, but she was too shocked to care. It was a lie anyway, the back of her mind reminded, but even  _that_ did not matter in the presence of a ghost.

Amanda switched her gaze between the Samuels model and the execs. Her mind racing. That model didn't have a single scratch, not a single burn. It was impossible, he couldn't have been the same man she had as a friend. 

"We thought it would be a smart idea to assign an emotional support droid to you. A service dog, if you will" one of the men said, chewing on the cigar in his mouth. Rich pig even laughed.

"Smart idea my ass. You know damn well..." she started, but couldn't finish. The anger in her was just too much, her body could not contain the hate she felt. Hate for them, hate for that synth, hate for the whole damn place.

"How are you feeling, Amanda?"

"Bloodlust, I feel bloodlust" she spitted without thinking. She had so many conversations with the man inside her head she forgot it was only a fantasy about honesty. Chris wasn't really there.

Whenever she had dreams about him she would tell Wright and the medical droid would inform her again and again of the official decommission date of her friend. There was one, even if they never let her see the body. Amanda understood it was not out of cruelty, but out of service. She couldn't stay in the belief that her friend was alive. She musn't She saw him die. She saw him die. She saw-

Now a guard was inching closer from outside the room.

Ridiculous, she thought. The Samuels itself was enough to overpower her, if not then Wright surely. There was no need for a guard. She took a deep breath to calm herself down.

"Who's idea was this?"

To her surprise, Wright stepped forward and gave her a strange look. It was meant to be devoid of emotion, yet there was something behind it. Almost like a will, like a hidden message she had to crack. A key she had to find.  
No, she was doing it again, she was looking for answers that never existed. 

"I suggested we get someone resembling to your friend to provide emotional stability. It worked before with other patients and I'm sure it will work for you."

"I refuse"

"You can't" the man with a cigar scoffed and put his cigar out of fire. "We are tired of your whining, Ripley. You need to drop Sevastopol and let the past **_die_** _._ Let it stay dead."

Amanda raised an eyebrow. Was that bastard serious? She was busting her ass on this junkyard of a station to keep it from falling apart and that was what she got in return?

"That's right, I read your file. I know about your so called nightmares and anxiety attack, but there is actually nothing wrong, Ripley. You are just being a whiny little girl who is scared of an imaginary monster"

For once it was a delight to recall the body of that monster she fought at Sevastopol. Amanda closed her eyes and for once let the memory loose, for once the flaming ship became her 'happy place'. At least as long as it had this fat pig in it. She imagined watching him crawling on the ground, like she did. He heaved and whined and cried, like she did. But in the end the creature comes and finds him and devours him, one piece at a time. Only when it's done and the imaginary screams die inside her head does she open her eyes.

She smiles even though her new dark happy place was just born out of her greatest nightmare. The thought lingers, her superego now terrified of the darkness it became aware of. A murderous wish that of course will never be fulfilled, but she had it and that's what mattered.

Maybe she did need that robot... Before she completely loses herself. Before she suffocates that man with a wrench herself.

"Fine" she sighed, letting the whole thing go. Still, her anger boiled her blood to the point where it felt like acid rushing trough her veins. Without any output, that anger remained embedded inside her, lingering like a faint poison to her mind.

"Great" an other man with papyrus dry skin clapped and rubbed his bony hands together. "Then it's settled. Dr. Wright will use her psychological assessment of you to adjust the personality modem to your liking."

"Sure, whatever"

 

The road back home was silent, the three of them sat in a shuttle Wright called to avoid further draining the already exhausted Amanda's energy.

"So do you really think this will work?"

The question was in itself stupid, Amanda thought, since Wright wouldn't have suggested it otherwise. Yet as she took a sip from her alcohol (no brand or anything, just about three steps away from actual poison) she looked at the blonde droid in confusion. Wright was walking around her small apartment, looking at corners and touching the lower side of tables and inner part of lamps. She was looking for bugs.

Amanda took an other sip and with a painful expression walked up to the other woman. She felt uneasy as the Samuels model stood in the kitchen and just  _stared_ into nothing, devoid of any life. Not dead though, she knew how that would look like, but that was not it. Maybe if there really was a soul, in humans and synths alike, then that was missing from her model. 

"I have no doubt-" Wright started, but didn't finish her sentence, before she made sure the place was clear. " that it's the stupidest idea I have ever came up with. My processor heats up just by thinking about how illogical it is, but my executives took the bite and that's what matters.

Now Amanda was sure, there was something seriously wrong with Wright. She never acted like this. Sure, she had sass sometimes, but not this much. This was far more self-aware, than her usual self.

Amanda awkwardly sat down, unsure of how much of this is actually strange and how much is just the alcohol. Maybe it was normal. Not her normal, but the average. Clearly after today's fantasy there was something seriously wrong with her.

"Amanda, have you ever heard about the phrase 'rogue program'?"

"Yes? It's an anomaly in synthetics that affect their logic core. This is why you guys need checkups every months, to get rid of these, right?"

"That is correct, but also, there is an other thing. Because our makers are not sure about how these anomalies happen, the codes removed during maintenance are saved for later research" Wright explained while letting her hair down. She sat down next to Amanda. With one swift move she placed a small, silver flash drive on the table before them.   
"It's him. or at least what I managed to salvage from the server and the body."

That was too much, way too much for Amanda. Him? Did that mean... It couldn't have been...

Amanda took a breath. Then an other one. A sigh. A nod. A shake of her head. Thoughts rushing trough her mind. This was more than she could process.

"What do you mean" is all she could ask, looking at the small driver.

"They lied, Amanda. He was not dead, not completely"

The weight of the words kicked the air out of her lungs.  _Not_ _completely_ , which means she left him there, struggling. She left him alone. She left him and now he was truly dead.

"Amanda, Amanda listen to me! He came to me! He asked me to help him and to help you. I saved as much as I could. Anything I could find, saved files, notes made by him, memories."

"So are you telling me-" Amanda slowly raised her hand to touch the driver. She only noticed now how thin her arm became over the past year and the skin was paler than ever. Ugly veins peeked trough her thin skin and to her elbow it was covered in fresh scratches and burn marks. Between her fingers she played with the flash. Such a small thing. But if there really was a soul, in humans and synths alike, then this little silver thing contained the one she was missing.

A plan has started to blossom in her mind, she kind of understood what was going on with the seemingly empty Sammuels model and as much as this was overwhelming her, she had worse. With a new wave of determination she grabbed the driver. Her fingers hugged the item like a precious key. It was the key to her salvation, to everything she ever hoped and sometimes even prayed for. Just to have one person back, one person to make surviving actually worth it.

"How do I get him back?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wohoo, Amanda is back in the game! So is Sammuels, apparently :O


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Do robots dream? And if they do, what is it about? Samuels and Wright might be able to answer that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's see how Samules managed to get a homerun.

Cold.

He imagined it would feel cold in space.

Floating with the remains of Sevastopol, he was unable to feel anything. All of his sensors were out. Was he even alive? The only thing that gave him some sense of existence was the location index and his company leash, the emergency beacon. Soon a Weyland-Yutani ship would come for him to collect the data inside him.

Not the kind of pick-me-up he needed.

God, he hoped Amanda got out in time. Was there any chance they would let him live just enough to learn about her fate? He wished he could calculate the probability of that, but everything was fried. Blind, deaf, unable to touch or move, there was nothing to do. Somehow he missed the sunset and the humming of engines and the smell of oil and sweat and the noise people made. If droids could dream, he would dream about that. He would dream about a busy hangar with orange light and the window shutters would go up and shower the place with the golden light of a dying star.

He would walk around and watch people work. Watch them turn their heads from him and rather talk with their human companions. Hate and fear would drip like sweat from them. Does he really want to dream of that? He preferred not to.

 _Preferred_. Such a strange, forbidden word. For humans it was just a simple thing, to have a preference. They prefer soda over water, they prefer the opposite or same sex, they prefer not to die. For droids it was either in their code or not. In his it was not written to have feelings about the opinions of human crew members so he never had.

But Amanda Ripley preferred to work alone and be alone and see nobody in the process at all. So there was a different kind of hate in her eyes when he introduced himself and somehow he  _preferred_  that hate over the others’. Because if was not about who he was, but what he was made to be. A company dog.

He wished there was one happy moment in Amanda Ripley's life he has witnessed. Then he could recall that visual data, mix it with the color and lighting of a sunset and would pretend it's a dream until his final hour comes. Sadly, he never saw Amanda Ripley smile. Maybe if he had a second chance, a second run he would focus on that.

At least she had closure. That's what matters. That was his goal. From the beginning, somehow his orders mixed with this rogue idea. Reading her file, talking with her, seeing the bottled up excitement in her... He preferred to concentrate on that over some company mission.

God, his core program must've looked like garbage, riddled with anomalies from the lack of maintenance. There was a a lot about Sevastopol to unpack. How long would it take for them to determine his memories are useless and wipe his motherboard? Would they even do that, or just send him to be melted right away? Would they even listen to his plea to learn about Amanda's fate? He highly doubted it, and not just because he could not speak.

His beacon pinged. He was found. Soon everything would be over and he wouldn't be tormented with questions and uncertainty. So for the last time he just played the memory of Amanda Ripley showing her back to him, peacefully mending while facing the dying sunset. This was the closest he could get to a good dream.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Wright models are observant and good communicators. Ruthless in nature, they are the perfect negotiators in crisis. They also come with medical properties in case you want to have the same robot perform medical and psychological evaluations. They are just good like that. And in case you wondered, that hot bod is indeed  **fully**  functional"

The sales pitch was completely unnecessary, but her maker did it anyway. They were already on the company ship. Seven specialists, three soldiers and the two of them. The plan was crazy by all means, but Wright did not care. She was made not to care. Once her maker let the captain go on his way, there was only the two of them in the small medical room. 

"So, did you learn anything about the destination of this shit?" 

They were traveling from Monerco, a small station not far from Sevastopol. It was an independent, but almost completely legal station somewhat dependent on Weyland-Yutani. A place that only served as a restocking place for ventures between larger stations. They got on there, when the previous synth of the crew mysteriously malfunctioned and could no longer function. 

Frankly Toller , her maker didn't even care to check where they were going. It was fine by him as long, as he could get off that metal island in the middle of nowhere. Anything else was better. Or so he thought, before Wright told him they are there to pick up a lost droid from the remains of Sevastopol Station.

"Sevastopol? Are you kidding me, W? Really? I get us off that junkyard only to land on another?" he hissed and leaned close to her face. Small drops of sweat washed the dirt of his pale face and painted it even paler in streaks. He was a small fish in the sea of WY, but for a small fish he had quite the appetite. He was not above anything really to get a nice spot near the greasy pan.

"The mission is to return it to the Company, we are going to Delion, eventually" she explained without moving back, recalling the info downloaded from the ship's database. "I already arranged to be the one who monitors the data collection, so even if there is a secondary location mentioned, the Company won't learn about it. Just a useless robot with nothing to offer. Eventually they will have to return to Delion empty handed."

Somehow her ruthless behavior delighted him. He cupped her face in his long fingered hands and looked at her the same way he looked at the stars. Wright did not understand what he saw in her that induced such affection. However, when he kissed her, she welcomed it. 

"You are the best, babe" he whispered on her lips. Strangely, after running a test, she did not find alcohol in his breath. Usually he was drunk when he made a move on her, but maybe now he was drunk on the success of their heist.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Strongbow, a Company owned ship made its way through the debris, following the faint signal of the beacon. 

"Come on, make it quick, Kim! That battery can die in any minute, I needed that droid inside medical like yesterday!" The captain clapped and walked around the main computer to look at the radar.

"Korivan, is that movement?"

"Sorry sir, I'm trying to calibrate our secondary radar to only track organic matter. We might have survivors" a younger boy, around 20 explained. Wright noticed how he trembled. Korivan, Korivan, it did ring a bell for her.

"Your mother was on the station, right?" She stepped to his station and picked up the picture of an older woman from beside the monitor. The boy nodded and focused his gaze on the dots. "My Ma is dead, ma'am. They sent me her medical report, an explosion killed her days before the destruction of the station."

"Then why are you looking for survivors?"

Her question was simply informative, not aimed as judgement, yet both captain and the boy raised an eyebrow. 

"I can look for them so you can focus on finding the beacon" she added, reacting to the mood. "I was made to be able to make quick decisions based on small amount of data, you weren't" she added. This somehow calmed them down and Korivan even gave her a thankful nod. She stepped in and continued the work by ignoring any movement short enough to be just a floating corpse. For the longer ones she paid more attention to the pattern. They were not like the pods where the vector of the motion barely changed and the route was somewhat straight. These movement were more agile, changed directions a lot and happened in waves.

Still she said nothing. As long as they don't bother looking behind the larger parts, there is nothing stopping them from making this quick. 

And quick it was once they found the droid. Burned almost to a crisp but still promisingly intact. They pulled him in, job was done. Or so she thought.

"Captain, I'm picking up something!"

 

Toller groaned as he watched the woman laying before them. "So? What do we do with her?"

The question was loaded with another one.  _How do we get rid of her?_  Picking up a survivor and then thawing her out would result in a much more complicated and meaningful mission report where the presence of a modified Wright model would stick out like a sore thumb. It was annoying. All this work just to get a human off a station and on another.

“Put her in cryo. I will tell the captain our equipment is not sufficient for her treatment. That way by the time the higher-ups start asking questions you are already off the grid.”

“Sweet” Toller clicked his tongue and put a small kiss on her forehead. “What would I be without you?”

Wright was now certain that whatever affection the man has felt for her it was not strong enough to make him notice she only mentioned him getting off the grid. Obviously Toller was a genius when it comes to coding. After all he was able to write his own AI and put it in a Company droid. Wright was just a mean to an end and surely he was ready to throw her under the bus if needed. knowing how bad he was at covering up his tracks, it was bound to happen. She rather just focused on starting the data collection of the Samuels model.

“Hello brother” she greeted the charred corpse of the WY synthetic. It was ironic, since only her body belonged to the Company. Her AI was created by Benjamin Toller, independent from Weyland-Yutani.

“So Samuels. Tell me all your secrets”

He was on the medical table, connected to the interface by cables pierced into his neck and scalp. A brainwave monitor’s needle raised every time there was some kind of activity, and for this fellow, the needle was dancing like crazy.

Wright took a cable and inspected it. Sure she could just let the data download and then censor it to her liking, but what was the fun in that? This was the perfect opportunity to gain some understand as to why a synthetic would want to work for WY with such loyalty. As far as she knew she was the only AI created for the purpose of infiltrating the mammoth corporation. The data he was holding might had some use in further operations.

Pushing the cable into her ‘brain’ was not the worst pain she had felt. There were times when Toller would get angry, not with anything, just in general and would block her control over her pain receptors. This would make her unable to not feel the pain he inflicted and naturally that would make her scream. She had no hard feeling though, she might have been young but she knew humans were like that. They used synthetics, sometimes for works, sometimes for other, darker things. Synths were expendable.

“Please help” a voice called for her the moment she activated the connection. No it was not even a voice, more like a will inside her head. She never had a firewall for such connections because Toller never anticipated such connection. Now, without protection that will was slipping inside her like an animal, fleeting from a forest fire. She wanted to pull the cable out, but the force invading her mind overpowered her.

“I am so sorry, but you need to listen to me. I don’t care if you kill me after this but please just tell me what happened to Amanda Ripley”

The sheer despair shook Wright to her core. These things, feelings slipped inside her like arms, showing her pictures of a woman, played clips of her voice and gave any information that would help her track down said person. It was unnecessary, she knew exactly who the woman was. She left her with Toller. Amanda Ripley was their picked up survivor.

Wright was now more than intrigued. What kind of person that woman is to create a connection with a synthetic so strong he has no other desire but to know she is okay?  
One thing Wright knew: If it was Toller in the cryo she wouldn’t care. Fuck, even though Toller was a human, he sure as hell wouldn’t care about his own creation’s wellbeing as long as it served him.

“She is alive. We put her in cryo.”

As soon as she answered the other AI’s signals calmed down. Samuels was getting ready for the wipe. For his death.  
Wright’s fingers lingered on the buttons. This was something she’s never felt before. This was not servitude, but purpose. She had no desire not reason to kill it. In some way she felt like a piece was missing from her, deliberately left out from her programing by Toller. That piece was however intact inside Samuels’ core. Everything she was ever curious about but feared to ask his maker lied inside the dying robot. As far as she knew that might have been the only AI capable of really caring about another human being.

“You know what” her voice was stoic as she punched in the commands. Even if someone was there to see her, they would have been unable to read her decision off her face, even though she made the ultimate one.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Samuels felt like a weight was being lifted off of him. Maybe this is what death felt like. He was content with it. Amanda was okay, she headed to a place where they would take care of her. So it was okay. Okay for him to die.

But nothing like that happened. Quite contrary, he felt more alive than in the past few days.  
First he heard a hum, it was an engine. Then he saw light, a medical bay. He felt the weight of his body and the touch of clothing on his skin. Morbidly enough he saw his own body on the table lying lifeless, empty.

“Welcome aboard, brother” the other AI greeted him as if they shared the same processor, which of course was impossible.

“Double core, Samuels. I had some extra space where I can store your program. There isn’t much left. I removed everything unnecessary so don’t bother trying to move my body, you don’t have the functions for that. Now be nice and silent while we are on this mission.”

“Thank you. Wright, is it?”

“For now, yes. And don’t thank me, I’m not doing this out of good heart”

That was quite alright. He was alive and frankly he was happy to be so.

In the following weeks He and Wright worked together. They made the data got from Samuels’ body technically useless by corrupting any file connected to the creature. Meanwhile they talked a lot about humans and how different they viewed them.

For Samuels they were innocent until proven otherwise. Synthetics made to serve and so they did not pass judgement on their makers. that being said Wright almost laughed when after an argument with Toller Samuels described him as ‘quite rubbish for a man’.

For Wright it was a splash of cold water. She never thought that the existence of kindhearted humans would make her so uncomfortable. It made her realize how bad of a place she got herself into and how desperately she needed a chance to het away from Toller. Because whenever Toller hit her or burnt her hand or made her feel guilty of his own fuck-ups, Samuels would also feel that. Not only that but he would express his deepest regret to be unable to help and sometimes even pepper in the fact, that Amanda Ripley would never willingly hurt her like that. In fact, most people would at least raise an eyebrow on his behaviour and probably a lot of them stop him.

“But only because I’m company property” she would argue and she would be right. But this did not change the fact that there was a place where they wouldn’t hurt or manipulate her.

Delion started to sound even better, than before. The promise of a new beginning. Samuels came up with a plan that would both get Amanda into good hands and get Wright out of Toller’s grasp if she wished to be free of him.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That plan’s next chapter lied in Amanda’s hand, on a silver flashdrive. Wright could almost hear Samuels’ words, even though his voice is no longer in her head.

_I lay my very existence in your hand, Amanda Ripley._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'As it turns out there was no need to search for Samuels. Samuels was inside us all along' - Wright, probably


	4. Chapter 4

 "How do I get him back?"

She smelled burning plastic and dried blood even thought there was none in her apartment. No, she shook her head. Mentally she was in Sevastopol again, ready to fight some more. Maybe it was time. 

Time to go back and fight, not just for survival but for her friend. She never had such luxury back then. Ricardo, Taylor, Verlaine... They tried to help her and in the process got hurt, got murdered. 

"That might be harder than I first imagined" Wright stated, braiding her hair.

Amanda noticed how the android almost always had to do something with her hands. It was a small oddity that first made her see Wright as a human employee. She only realized her mistake one night when she stayed up late and at the office met with the blonde. She naively asked why isn't she at home, sleeping to which Wright stopped and after a few second she simply answered "I don't sleep".

"Are you anxious, Ripley?"

Pacing up and down, Amanda glared at her.

"What makes you think that?" She was barefoot, her hair now let down to try and relax at least some muscles, while she walked around, thinking. She was holding Samuels. The... drive, that contained his core system and memories. Silvery coin. 

Wright lazily rolled her eyes. "The model I got for Samuels... It's the same series but a newer model. They are made to be hyper realistic to blend in society better."

"And how the hell did you manage that?" Amanda put her arms on her hip. She couldn't even get a spare ion cutter to work from home without needing to talk to god knows how many managers and officers of safety as well as fill out a mountain of paperwork AND undergo a psychological evaluation to prove she is not planning to cut a hole in an oxygen pipe. "And why? Why not just get a Samuels of the same version?"

"Because they are no longer manufactured and stored  _empty._ And believe me Ripley, I'm not going to kill a brother in order to save another. Besides, requesting a more realistic model fits my story. I told them it must be able to fulfill whatever social need you might have."

Amanda sat down and stared at the other woman. It didn't even crossed her mind that getting an other Samuels and loading Chris on that model would count as murder. As a sacrifice. Something she was ready to make without thinking, without skipping a beat. It scared her, how much more humanity Wright had. It was something to be gained of course but also something Amanda lost greatly as the cost of survival.

"So what is the hard part? Are there any compatibility problems?"  _Not that it matters_ , she thought. Samuels went to the greatest length to help her and now she was ready to return the gesture. No mater how much she has to hack and wack, she would get there. 

"I deleted anything unnecessary to be able to store him. I did salvage some from the archives but they were mostly memories. He has to download a lot of new divers for this body" Wright halted. "I never saw any AI put itself back together."

 Wright's voice was stoic as ever. Matter of fact. She didn't really care about the outcome but she was curious. Whatever would happen, she would like to witness it. Either resurrection, or fatal decay awaited him. She also knew it was fine by Samuels. He made it very clear when they first met, all he cares about is Amanda's safety. So Wright imagines it would suck for him to die but he would probably okay with it, that weird brother.

"How long until we know?" Amanda bit her nails, a bad habit she didn't remember picking up but did it anyway. Still, Wright enjoyed the determination crawling back into the engineer.

That's the spirit Samuels was talking about. The  _never giving up, just moving forward_ attitude. God knows Ripley needed that, now more than ever. She had to get her act together in order to stand whatever Wright was about to tell her. But maybe it wasn't time for that.  Yet.

"Best case: a full day circle" she stated, making the already shaken Amanda wide eyed, like a deer in front of some headlights. A strand of brown hair fell in front of her face as the woman snapped her head up to look at the Samuels model.

"A day? At best? What the fuck?"

"Ripley, imagine having you body being ripped apart, limb-by-limb" Wright started and her voice lowered, almost like a growl. Her expression flattened, became less carefree and more pissed. "Now imagine being in a library, where your body parts have been scattered, hidden inside books you have to find. You have a finite number of limbs in an infinite collection of books. How long do you think it would take to grow them back? A day or two?"

Amanda was almost sure in that moment Wright was really close to stand up and slap her, based on her tone. Still the android had a neutral face, lips pouting a bit, maybe.

"I understand, Wright. I'm not complaining. I'm concerned. You have to go back to the office and I have a health check appointment in an hour"

"Health check? I am your official medical unit, am I not?"

Wright almost sounded hurt. It was like walking on eggshells: Amanda couldn't guess which sentence would get an emotional reaction from her and what would meet indifference. 

"Are you jealous I'm getting an other doctor checking me out?" She tried to laugh it off. "Not because I don't trust you, believe me!"

"Are they human?"

"Ye- What does it matter? I don't think anyone would do their job better just because they are human."

"Good, because they don't. I was made to be perfect. They don't."

"Wright, I..." Amanda stopped and stared at her friend. Something started to unravel inside Wright and it was painfully obvious.

"Excuse me, Ripley" she stood up quickly. "It's been a while since my last maintenance and I'm afraid my core is riddled with errors. I better get going."

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It took many back roads and alleys to get to the slums. Rotting meet on the market stalls, crumbling walls and a constant hum of sorrow. Wright's white coat  stood out like a sore thumb. Men looked her, eyed her up but decided she doesn't worth the risk. She was obviously someone with power. That, and with a gun. Weapons weren't common in Delion. It was strictly forbidden for civils to bare firearm and it took a middle-class manager's yearly payment to purchase one revolver. 

Frustration grew inside her as she cut trough the thick fog and dust. She played the previous exchange with Ripley over and over, trying to find what exactly made her react that way. She couldn't find the logic and _that_ was a really bad sign. Storing Samuels really messed her up. That, or her monthly maintenance guy was not doing his job properly. 

"Toller, you bastard" she slammed her hand on his table. The man was grinning, sweat slowly run down his face as he fastened a screw in his prosthetic left arm.

"Nice to see you too, baby" he whispered as he got up, flexing his mechanical fingers.

"It get's worse and worse. You either do your job properly, or-"

"Or what? You get a WY specialist to find out you are not factory made? I'm all over your code, I made sure of that." He got closer, breathed inside her perfume and played with her braid. Suddenly, he grabbed the android by the throat and pushed her to the wall. "You are mine, know that bitch."

Wright stood straight and listened to him. She felt no pain or suffocation but it did frustrate her how dependent she was. 

"Now tell me the magic words."

Despite his request Wright remain silent that made Toller's mechanic grasp tighter. It made a dent on her neck. The skin-like material started to rip.

"TELL ME"

"I'm a bad robot with messy codes."

"AND?"

"Make me a good robot, please." At least there was nobody else seeing her in her current state. 

Toller finally released her and lit a cheap cigarette.

"Sit down. I will make you better."

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wrapping a leather strip around it, Amanda tied the drive containing Samuels around her neck. She had to go out and wouldn't risk losing him again. There could be a fire or explosion or looters and she would loose her house rather than the man.

"Sorry for making you wait. I just..." Amanda stopped and faced her reflection with disgust. "Stop talking to yourself, he can't hear you."

Leaving her apartments she shut down the body of Samuels. Frankly it made her a bit uneasy. It was truly an uncanny valley experience to see and hear him without anything being there. Now it was just a robot without an AI. It had a few commands programmed in, a few lines. It would sometimes say "Greetings, Amanda" or "How are you feeling, Amanda" or (most funnily) "That's nice, Amanda". But it wasn't funny, for her. It was terrifyingly close to how the Seegson androids sounded with their "Running causes accidents" bullshit.

On her way to the doctor's office her thoughts raced each other, fighting for her focus. Her stomach jumped every time she touched the small flash drive, but sunk immediately as she remembered Wright's words. She never thought about it being a problem. Having a human doctor. For her it was never an issue because the reason she went to him was because he was the one operating her. He  _knew_ what happened to her and it took her almost a year to track him down.

While in transit, her breathing became heavier, labored. The wheels screeched as the cabin stopped. 

"Delion Medical Quarter" the female voice announced, sending Amanda in a shivering attack. 

No. She has to get off. She has to get there, get her answers.

_Come on Amanda. Walk, goddammit!_

She was out, right before the doors closed. There the squeaky clean windows reflected the sun's lazy rays  and looking at them was almost painful. Cleaning robots run up and down, not even a grain of dust could've settle in this part of the station. But everything was white, white like death. Blank. Still, it was better than red or black.

"Dr. Pines?"

"That would be my name, yes." An almost grotesquely happy woman with short, gray hair and freckles all over her face looked up from under a pile of files. 

Amanda, stunned from surprise looked at her data pad and then back to the woman. Sure the picture had some resemblance, but still, she clearly saw a man on the picture.

"I'm sorry, I might be looking for your brother?" 

"Nope, I remember you. Amanda, right? Let me see" she giggled and reached out for the datapad. "That's me alright. Only this picture was taken like three years ago."

Amanda noted and took a breath to start with explaining while she is here, but before she could, Dr. Pines stopped here.

"I know why you are here, darling. I heard all about you. It's okay. Let me just grab your file and you can ask away!"

Well, this day was surely one in a million. Amanda caught herself smiling. She had Samuels back and now she will get some answers. But then again... Was she ready to get those answers?

"Is it really okay to show me this? The people back in Ivory were really secretive."

" Hon, you survived the collapse of a station due to company miscalculations. They give you good hush money but in return you are expected to actually hush. Personally I believe this could be easily solved by being honest with you. Starting with your surgery."

Another shiver and Amanda had to sit down. Was it all true?

"Now before I show this I have to ask you to treat this as greatly sensitive data. This between you and me. I could lose my job over this, but frankly dear you can lose even more." The woman smiled but there was something cold about her. Cold honesty. Maybe that's what she needed, like a cold shower to treat her nausea.

The file stated that Amanda Ripley got on station via the Strongbow and was in cryosleep until the day of the operation. The surgeon in command was Dr. Robin Pines who ordered the life saving operation after noticing a tear in the muscle tissue.

"So it's true? My heart was just... weak?"

"What did you expect, dear?" Pines tilted her head in wonder. "You were in a pod for god knows how long. You were almost out of air when they found you. Officer Wright made the right decision to put you in cryo."

She was getting sick. This was not what she was expecting. Was the fight really over? Truly over? Then why was she angry? The same anger she felt back with the execs, but tenfold. The room was getting too small, her wrists hurt, like she was bound for so long. Her head was pounding. It was only a nudge when she arrived, but now it was seriously affecting her vision. The lights were too strong. She felt like a wounded animal.

"Wait. What the hell do you mean I was in a pod? I was floating... I opened the... airlock." Her head was pounding but she could clearly remember. Boarding the Torrens. Opening the door and finding herself in front of a creature. Pushing the airlock's opening button.

"Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure" she shouted, making it even harder to breath.

"Amanda, it's alright. You've suffered a great deal, lost a lot of good people. Coming here must be hard." Pines' words somehow calmed her down, but only a little. Now she just wanted to go home. Get working on Samuels. "I have a feeling you weren't expecting these answers. I want to help, I want you to get over this, but I can't do that unless you trust me."

"Okay" Amanda nodded. "Okay. Let me try."

Finally, Dr. Pines smiled and reached into her pocket to drop a candy in her mouth. "That's all I ask for."

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wright felt empty. So empty and so...  _hurt._ There were no signs of Toller's abuse, at least not on the outside and that's what mattered.

She entered Ripley's apartment only to find the woman in almost complete ruin. She sat in front of the Samuels model that lied at the foot of her bed. On the bed the laptop hummed desperately, it's RAM completely consumed by the installation of Samuels. 

The mechanic had one hand in her knot-riddled hair, resting her arm on her knee, just staring.

"I will get you a drink. You obviously need one."

"You too" Amanda answered faintly, only looking up for a second.

"I'm alright. Besides, it would be wasted on me." It was fine, really. She got a beer from the fridge and sat beside Ripley. "So how is he doing?"

"In the library, I guess?"

"And how are you doing? How was that doctor?"

"Wright i didn't go to her because she is human. I just... She was the one operating me. I needed answers. And I got them."

Wright closed her eyes for a second. That bastard Toller did nothing. She still had...  _emotions._ She was supposed to simulate them yes, but is it really simulation if she feels them in secret? What if they are not about showing sympathy but about regret and shame? Are robots supposed to feel shame? Toller had one job and it was to make her feel less. To clear her code. To make her a good robot. But the moment she got home... no, to Ripley's home. It was Ripley's home. Sure they spent hours, sometimes even days here (when Ripley's ptsd resulted in a series of attacks and she had to take the day off to recover) but that doesn't mean she was allowed to consider this anything other than a patient's home. Even if Ripley was her only patient.

"Wright? Wright!"

"Apologies. I just had a wipe, I'm kind of all over the place."

"That's okay" Ripley took a sip from her beer. "I just asked you about how you managed to convince them I worth to be given more therapy. I mean, they already gave me a house and money..."

"It's suspicious, isn't it?"

The two women sat in silence. Ripley sent down half of the bottle before answering.

"They could've just kill me to keep me silent."

"Something tells me this is not your first drink."

"Nope" Amanda giggled and crawled closer to Samuels. She hid an empty bottle of whiskey in the coat of the man. "You know... until now I couldn't even look at this bottle."

"I have a hard time believing, given that it's now empty."

"I used to make bombs out of these. Molotov cocktails. Compound B, sensors, some ethanol or any strong alcohol really and a blasting cap. I lit it and threw it into the darkness. It hit something, it broke and there was fire everywhere. And all that thing did was running away."

Wright looked at Ripley and then at Samuels. What the hell did they go trough? Sometimes Ripley talked with such pain in her voice. She wasn't in pain, not physically. It made Wright realize how similar they were. There were no sign of injuries, yet something was wrong. Inside.

"I know you don't believe me. No one does."

The woman sure drank quickly, Wright noted as Ripley got up and got herself another bottle of beer.

"I was made to be able to make quick decisions based on small amount of data" Wright recited from her quirk log. "Judgement however is not on my table. I saw whatever Samuels saw and heard whatever he heard. He believed it was the creature. I don't think it's cold hard evidence. Nor was I present during your operation. But based on how everyone acts around you I believe you are still somehow a valuable asset that must remain on the station for whatever reason. That's why they are making it comfortable for you."

"Thank you, Wright, I appreciate that" Ripley patted her shoulder and then proceeded to grab a bowl from the counter and throw up in that. 

"Ripley, go take a shower and lie down."

"But-"

"I will watch Samuels. You need rest. Whatever that doctor told you it made everything worse or so it seems."

"But-"

"Amanda Ripley, don't make me sedate you."

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So how does one look for body parts in a library?

Do androids dream?

Is it a dream for Christopher Samuels to glide trough the endless haze of the Internet, looking for drivers for this difficult, new body? Or maybe that's just sleepwalking and the dream is the faint singing coming from an other room, muffled by flowing water.

By logic, after what he has heard, that would be Amanda Ripley, but Amanda Ripley never sings. Never did on the Torres and definitely not on Sevastopol. Yet the new, intuitive voice recognition tells that is indeed Amanda's untrained range. Abstract, illogical, yet real.

How strange, he thought, for that to be the first sound he hears with this new body. Of course there are cars and people outside and water inside; electronics humming; rattling from an old, faulty fridge... All this noise but he zoomed on her voice. The new audio drivers made it possible to filter trough sounds so should he want to, he could've just mute everything and listen to the woman singing. That and her occasional grunts and mumbling about being way too drunk.

Samuels wanted to get up and investigate. Run his medical assessment on the woman, ask her to next time refrain from such reckless alcohol consumption and maybe put her into bed because knowing Wright, she would just stop the blood flow to Amanda's brain until she would pass out. Gently, but still.

That model did not have the laws of robotics fully implemented in her, that was for sure.

While laying paralyzed on the ground he recalled the day the Strongbow docket to Delion. Amanda looked like she was having a nightmare while in cryostasis, in her glass coffin. He begged Wright to follow Amanda as much as it was possible. Luckily Wright was so intrigued by his stories she went with the plan. Or at least would have went for it if it wasn't for Toller.

 

> **_A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm_ **

That rule was already barely intact during the three day journey from Sevastopol to Delion.

It was Toller's faul, really. He wanted to get rid of Amanda. Wright explained before that her maker modified the laws so only his life would matter and then Wright's. This served their self-preservation but contradicted the code in Samuels. Like conjoined twins with a shared leg, but different directions in mind, it made walking hard. Not that Samuels was able to move her actual body, but his thoughts, his  _feelings_ about the matter were in the way.

 

> **_A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law._ **

So when the order arrived "Gas her capsule" Wright's system froze for long minutes. In those long minutes they both felt like floating in burning acid, flooded by errors and contradictions; their codes intertwined like umbilical cords, suffocating in the same, shared void. Double core or not, the body was too small for two AI's.

Samuels remembered telling Wright she can't kill Amanda. He remembered being questioned why and only being able to answer "Due to my programming." What bothered him about that is his past actions.

 

> **_A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws._ **

Amanda's life was not on the line when he forced Apollo open. Nor was he given an order to do so. Nobody ever asked him such a thing yet it was out of question. A necessity. For Amanda Ripley's closure.

So in a way, when it came to Amanda, laws,  _those laws_ did not bind him in such way as he anticipated. It was not because of the laws that he  _preferred_ Amanda alive. Than again, the real question is why Wright was okay with killing her? Samuels regretted not raising that question. It was not senseless or irregular to save Amanda. Killing her is.

He grunted as his vocal cords turned online. It wasn't as complicated, as the optical package. There were still remains of guilt in him for being ear witness to the mechanic's meltdown as the download of his visual drivers went on for hours. But at least now not only was his hearing impeccable , there was a myriad of new visual functions, like nightvision or thermal image with improved zoom and pattern recognition. There was also a new trick. "Reduce layer". It turned out to be a filter for different materials. Samuels figured it would be useful to see behind thinner walls and fabrics. Frankly he found that quite useless, but surely some programmer at WY must have took great pride in it and who knows... It might come in handy one day.

"Hello brother" Wright hummed ans sat beside him. He grunted again, now with a slightly higher tone. "I know, I know. It will be hard to get used to it. You are like a small, little snail, jammed into an octopus' body."

"Affirmative" he said without really moving his mouth. Yes and not. That was all he could say for now. like a child, slowly, painfully learning how to be in his body.

"Can you move?"

 _I would shake my head but that would oppose my point._ He thought, but in the end he just said no.

"Is he awake?"

Suddenly Samuels notice how the water stopped and soaked steps sprung beside him. "I... am... wake..." he struggled as he felt the wet skin around his face and neck.

"Fuck. You are overheated. How is ventilation?"

"Not... optimal" what he meant to say is that he is running way more programs than usual and honestly he only knows like half of them and what they do. The other half was like hieroglyphs and he was in desperate need of a Rosetta stone. There were just so many smallish codes that made no sense.

"I... feel...old"

Wright laughed and patted his chest. Or stomach. Or neck. The pressure sensors were going crazy, because he was already focusing on Amanda's hand locked around his arm. More than one person touching was just too much to calculate with all of this updates. And he still couldn't move.

"You are like a grandpa, brother. Take it easy."

"Will he be okay? Won't he melt?"

There was a sweetness in her worry, Samuels noted. It wasn't adorable, no. That was not possible. But admirable. There was certainty in Amanda Ripley's capability to worry for a synthetic like they actually had a heartbeat.

"I'm not specialized in synthetic mechanics, Ripley. I trust his body. It's his code that sustained real damage. Let him process all of this, go to sleep."

"Agreed" now his voice was more fluid, more movement around his lips, though he wasn't sure what exactly is going on up there.

"Did... Chris, did you just licked your lips?" 

His eyes darted to her face flushed with warm pink probably from the hot water of the shower. Her hair tucked in a towel turban. "Apologies... it was.. not... deliberate."

Damn this body and the twenty driver packs installing in the same time. He had no idea what was going on. His muscles had spasms as they slowly came online. He shivered and for a moment it felt like he was reading a book per second, just codes flashing by his eyes. Everything was happening at the exact same time. He heard muffled voices, he felt pressure  _somewhere_ but then in the next moment, nowhere. And then silence. Nothing.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cold.

He thought nothing compares to the calm cold of outer space. The coarse cloud on his mind as he floats in darkness, unable to sense anything around him. Not even his body. This was the same cold, but this time it was suffocating him. This time he felt imprisoned in this new body, this time he felt frustration grow inside him. But that was impossible because for frustration to grow there must have been a preference and he was not allowed such luxury. So where did it came from? Did he steal it? Was it something new? Was it something small, always there and only now did he realize it?

 

> _**Sadly, he never saw Amanda Ripley smile. Maybe if he had a second chance, a second run he would focus on that.** _

His eyes snapped oped, every muscle in his body tensed and like a spring was pulling him, he sat up. Only when he did, his head met with something soft yet hard, like a stone covered in silk. Or bone covered with skin.

"Son of a-" Amanda grunted as her nose met with Samuels' suddenly elevating forehead. 

"I told you it was too close. His movements are unpredictable" Wright explained as she held the shaking Samuels down with ease. Amanda just shook her head laughing. Her nose was red like a brick.

"I am terrible sorry. Just... give me a minute" Samuels groaned and closed his eyes. Finally, he was able to switch down a few functions. One by one, he cut down any process not necessary in the moment.

Visuals completely down. Audio down. Pressure, heat and moisture down. All sensors down.

Now he could focus on the muscles. So many new things.  _Dancing?_ Why would he need dancing when he can't even move his fingers? Why would anyone need dancing from a synthetic? Or origami techniques. Those artist packages, he knew they would cause trouble but he got greedy. The internet was wast and full of programs that humans had by default. For some reason he got almost drunk on the idea of finally being able to learn these human things. In reality it was like drinking whiskey: treasures wasted on him,  a robot that would never need these. But he had them, if nothing else, for the sake of having. He would never create anything original. No new movements, no shape made out of paper that hasn't been done by a human. 

There were a few things he wasn't even sure where to put. Codes he never saw, sensors he never used before. He decided to just ignore and shut them down. He survived without them so far, he can do that now too. He went trough all the muscles, all the joints and hidden bits. It might have been only a few seconds, but for him it seemed like a week of nonstop calibration. In the meantime he could only guess the words that left Amanda's lips. Based on previous data, they must't have been the most modest of all.

It was finally okay to turn back all his senses. Stimuli started pouring in. The dimly lit home with orange lights and soft shadows. The rusty browns and earthy grays that were hidden under colorful pillows and plants, so many plants. He was glad. They made the air fresh, as fresh as possible for a small apartment on a dirty space station. There was a faint smell of vanillin from either a candle or soap or medicine. The only concern he had was the room's temperature. It was colder than optimal. 

"I'm done... I believe" he reported and to his delight everything seemed fine. So he sat up, this time slowly, and faced Amanda. He opened his mouth but before he could form the appropriate words arms pulled him in a hug. Startled by a quietly sobbing Amanda, he tried to return the gesture, but his arms were clumsy. The movement was forces, like walking on ice and his wrists, as well as his fingers wouldn't move.

"Maybe not fully done" he noted. "Please excuse my inability to reciprocate the social gesture, Amanda."

He truly regretted it. Not only because that meant he was still not used to the new body, but also because the woman clearly needed a better embrace than his struggling attempt.

"Jesus Christ, Christ! I don't give a flying fuck about your hug. I just need it to believe."

"Believe?" He turned to Wright, who was sitting at his opposite side to Amanda. 

The blonde just shrugged and patted Amanda on her shoulder. "Amanda, Samuels still need time to calibrate his body and you need to rest yours. Can I trust you to sleep while I go out to run some errands? I will meet you in the morning."

Amanda nodded, still holding Samuels like he was a teddy bear.

"Oy, Ripley!" Wright snapped her fingers and Amanda snapped out of her daze. Only now did he study her face. A young, so young face but so tired. Blue and purple lied under her eyes, making the green appear dull, even with the furious sparks she sent towards the synthetic woman.

"Amanda, I can tell you are not taking the recommended eight hours for sleeping. If you go now you can still have a goodnight rest."

"Great. Now I have two medical officers nagging me" she groaned and rubbed the bridge of her nose in an attempt to hide the tears collecting in the inner corners of her eyes. Samuels noticed, but didn't mention it. The woman was clearly trying to maintain a cheerful mood.

"I was the one first contracted as responsible medical unit" he said with a hint of... he couldn't quite identify the tone he used or the emotion it simulated. His voice was the same but now he had a wider palette to work with both in expressions and tones. "Thought right now I'm not much more than a pile of old equipment collecting dust."

It was not his intention to show self-pity, it was merely a dissatisfied note about his state never meant to earn such an annoyed look from Amanda. "I have a friend who can take a look if you are still not better by the morning."

Wright was already packing when she stopped upon hearing Amanda's offer. "We should leave company hands out of Samuels' business, Ripley. It's painfully obvious when an AI is not in its designated model."

She should know as she was also a system out of place. A hermit crab housing in a golden thimble. Made by an independent programmer it would have only took one look at her codes to know she was never part of the Company. But Amanda didn't know that and Samuels promised Wright not to tell her. Despite this the mechanic nodded almost knowingly.

"My friend is more on the... independent side."

"Who is your friend?" Wright's eyes became almost snake.like as she squinted at Amanda with understandable concern and suspicion. Her experience with independent specialists was far from ideal.. Samuels also hoped it wouldn't be Toller. Not just for his own sake but also Amanda's. That man...

"A guy I know from the conventions. He works as a subcontractor for Weyland-Yutani, but he isn't really fond of the policies." To both of the synths delight, that was not Toller. Couldn't have been. After his accident, he cut all ties with the company. It was also unlikely he would connect Amanda. A person like him could nothing, but damage for her.

He quickly scratched that idea because he knew Amanda well enough to know she would never call someone like Toller a friend. Even is she didn't know that man or how he lost his arm - she did not need to know about that at all, he decided - she knew all to well how monsters work. 

It was painful, as much as pain is possible for synthetics, to think about all the times Amanda was out there, being preyed on by the creature and all the time he could not fulfill his duty to protect her or the other crew members of the Torres.  He closed his eyes for a moment and in his mind he thought it might even look human to be this overwhelmed by regret even if it was not an emotion but a dull sting-like notification in his system that informed him over and over again: he failed.

"Give me his name, I will look into his file" Wright demanded and for once Amanda just gave her the info without hesitation. She was too tired and maybe, though Samuels felt it was to wild to be true, she might have been too concerned about his well-being to risk the Company finding out about his existence. 

After the blonde left it took Samuels half an hour to finally get Amanda to go to bed.

"Samuels?"

"Yes, Amanda?" He tried to speak softly in the darkness, knowing how taxing it must be for the woman to instinctively listen for every thud, every little noise that might indicate danger. He knew she did that, Wright told him.

"How is your temperature?"

"Still a bit higher that default but it shouldn't be an issue, I can assure you."

"Oh good. Good. Are you sure?"

"Affirmative."

For a while there was silence and Samuels thought that was it. She finally fell asleep. But no. The sheets softly ruffled as she sat up. 

"You know, maybe you need a heat sink? Something that helps you regulate?"

In the darkness Samuels listened as she moved. Her feet shifted on her mattress, her hands caressed her own skin. Looking at her he didn't even need thermal vision to know she was shivering in the cold room. 

Slowly he stood up and shuffled to the other side of the bed. "May I sit?"

Without words the covers pulled back and there was enough space to put his back to the wall and sit beside her. 

"Is it better?"

"Quite alright" he nodded in pitch dark, looking at her concerned expression she thought was hidden. "How is your temperature, Amanda?" he finally asked. Samuels realized as awkward as that sounded there was nothing weird about this question. After all, he was the medical officer contracted for the Torres and legally he was still obligated to take care of her. Yes. So there was nothing wrong putting an arm on her shoulder to feel the cold sweat and to softly pull her closer as she remained speechless.

Finally, under the black blanket of Delion's night he put his arms around her to provide some heat, but the shiver only stopped when she finally broke and started crying. Quietly, silenced by her pillow and barely intact pride she grasped Samuels' shirt as an attempt to make sure he is still there in the morning.

 

_He could not know that her greatest nightmares always started the same: She was there, on Sevastopol and she still had everyone. She would walk around and talk and laugh. She would find him and smile and hug him because he is back and he is not dead. And when she finally, fully believed she had him back- he was lost again._

 

 


End file.
